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Authored by
Elizabeth Anne
B - Brampton Library Writing Contest
The purple shadows of the lofty mountains reflected eerily in the rippling water, as stone after stone was haphazardly tossed into the shimmering lake. Above, majestic trees surrounding the water were as still as statues, their normally playful leaves rigid in the windless calm.
The stillness of the landscape echoed through his soul as he tried to find solace. Somewhere there had to be an answer to his problems, yet no matter what happened to him, the mountains would still be there, as they had been for centuries. The trees would not care if trouble befell him. There was no comfort, no answer to his problems.
Carefully, he unclasped the locket from his neck, reverently touching the worn face and fingering the curves protruding from its surface that he knew so well. A hundred times, he'd completed this effortless action, and before he'd always found comfort in the simple touch. Yet now, he felt alone and shattered.
Gingerly, he opened the locket, broken on one side where the hinge no longer held the two pieces together. Inside, his mother's face smiled tenderly at him from the worn picture. His eyes hardened, gazing at her picture, and his hands tensed.
Yes, she had died that night so many years ago when a drunk driver had hit her crossing the street. Not once in his life had he ever cried, even the night she had died.
He rose angrily, his fist tightening around the locket. There was a loud snap, and the hinge shattered completely from the fragile piece, but the sole thought within his mind was the firm conviction she shouldn't have died. With the passion of all his crushing emotions surrounding him, he cast the locket into the water to join the stones at the murky bottom of the lake.
"John!" a voice called from the house.
A pretty little woman, showing the cares of her life through the gathering wrinkles around her eyes, strode down from the stairs, casting a shawl over her shoulder with a resolute manner. Her blue eyes met his as she approached, and seemed to penetrate to his very soul.
"Why are you out here alone?" she asked, placing her arms over his shoulders, her brow furrowing in a worried manner.
He shrugged off the gentle contact she made, and strode a few paces away, keeping his back to her. "I want to be alone Mary. I want answers."
"You won't find them by brooding," Mary told him, watching her husband sympathetically. "I know you're upset John, but you have to learn to let go."
He snapped around on his heels and fixed his angry eyes upon her, "Let go? Let go of my job? Let go of the only chance I had for a better life? Let go of my own daughter?"
" Victoria will be fine, John, it's just a little operation! You know that your sister Lisa took her to the hospital, and they said she'll be alright," Mary told him soothingly.
"Doesn't this disturb you? She's your daughter as much as mine, yet you're so calm. I want to be there! I want to be able to hold her hand and tell her everything will be all right. I want to be sure I won't lose her. Don't you care?!" John said forcefully, pacing.
Mary ran towards him and placed her hand over his lips, blinking back tears of anguish. "Stop, stop," she sobbed for a moment. He relented at once, and took her in his arms.
"I'm sorry, Mary," he said in a hushed tone, shocked that he could make his wife's pain any more difficult.
She looked up at him, once again in control of herself, and fixed her piercing blue eyes on his troubled face. "Don't make it harder on yourself by trying to understand why these things happen. You can't, the world's too convoluted for you. You just have to learn to forget your pain, accept you trials, and move on."
With a sigh, John nodded, trying to contain his emotions that still threatened to overwhelm him. He wanted to let go, but he couldn't. He had never let go of a single hurt in his life; he needed an answer for every question, and he would torment himself until he found one.
"Go back inside dear," Mary told him, "I'll have dinner ready soon."
He nodded submissively and slowly ascended the stairs up to his house. Every step felt like a nail in his coffin as his thoughts bore down on him. He settled down to watch the television, but scarcely had he been watching for a minute before an ad for Hawaii appeared on the screen. He nearly fell over in his surprise, as he struggled to grab the TV turner and be rid of the ad. No, no, he thought. It was another painful reminder of what could have been.
His job wasn't the best, but he had been moving up, and he'd had big hopes for the future. John had even been scheduled to attend a conference in Hawaii , which he highly anticipated. Plans had been so far set, he even knew his plane number: flight 107. The day before, he had been fired from the company without an explanation, and now he had to try to find another job quickly to support his family.
Angrily, John rose and began pacing. How could they fire him after ten years with the company? Didn't they know he had a family, and a sick little girl?
There was the sound of pots banging in the kitchen, and John sat down quickly before his wife caught him pacing. He didn't want to disturb her again, but he couldn't let go of his question. Still the question of why remained in his mind. There was no fault on his part, so why did it happen?
John sighed and turned the television back on, mentally prepared for any more travel ads that might appear. Nothing on the television could draw his attention, but he watched the screen nevertheless. The clanging of pots in the kitchen stopped.
A minute later, Mary peeped her head into the room, leaning on the doorframe. "Doing better?" she asked. Smiling weakly, he nodded. She seemed to weigh something in her mind, looking carefully at her husband. "Denis called earlier. He wants you to call him back," she told him finally, pronouncing each word carefully, knowing how he would react.
Mary's guess had been right, and John jumped up with a start. "I don't want to talk to him!"
"Honey, it's not Joe's fault you didn't have the money to invest. Maybe starting your own restaurant wasn't such a good idea anyway. I didn't like the look of the place," Mary placated him.
John made no reply, but stared emptily into the space before him. Weakly, he waved his hand towards her and muttered, "If he calls again, tell him I'm not here."
Her eyes full of pain watching her husband fall apart, Mary returned to the kitchen while John resumed his inner search for answers.
Denis had concocted a plan to buy an old store in the centre of town and convert it into a restaurant. Yet with this potential before him and a willing partner in the deal, he hadn't had enough money. Denis promised to pay half, but John could neither raise the necessary amount nor explain to him why he backed out of the deal. All John could claim was that the store wasn't fire safe. That was to be the end, for Denis wouldn't search for another place, and John wouldn't swallow his pride and admit he was short on cash.
The phone began to ring shrilly, startling him out of his reverie, and John snatched it up mechanically. "Hello?" he said slowly, as if awakening from a deep sleep to find himself in a strange new world.
"It's Lisa, John," his sister told him exhaustedly, the worry evident in her voice. " Victoria has been asking to speak to you all day. I didn't think it was best, but she's . very upset."
"Let me talk to her!" John nearly shouted, trying to control himself. The phone was passed to Victoria , and her sweet seven-year-old voice rang clearly over the phone, not with her normal laughing ring, but with deep anguish and fear.
"Daddy, I'm scared!" she whimpered, "I want to come home with you and Mommy. I don't want to die! Will I die Daddy? Oh, won't you come to me? I'm all alone!"
He yearned with all his heart to speak words of comfort to her, but his hands started to tremble, and the phone slipped from his grasp. Mary heard the bang and, coming into the room, pulled the phone to her ear and at once recognized her daughter's voice. Turning from John, she paced into the kitchen where he heard her voice calmly murmuring the same reassurances he had been unable to say.
It wasn't fair! Why did it have to be that way? He collapsed into his chair as his legs gave way beneath him, yet he didn't cry. He'd never cried, and he never would. All he wanted was to numb the pain.
Words scrolled across the screen on the news station, and he tried to understand. Something had happened .. There was an accident. It was . a plane accident! A plane on the way to Hawaii had crashed. He ran through his mind to recall the flight number, and paled as he remembered the number that minutes before had seemed so cruel and cold. 107. Flight 107 had crashed.
The shock was too great to comprehend completely what had happened. He stumbled to his feet, staring dumbly at the television screen. He would have been dead if he hadn't been let go! The phone rang again, and Mary popped her head into the room. "It's for you," she told him.
John turned around slowly and mechanically raised the phone to his ear. "Hello?" he began hesitantly, still shocked.
"Listen, John, it's Denis. I want to apologize for what happened. I shouldn't have been angry with you for not wanting to invest. Your instincts were on about the store. This morning the whole place was destroyed in a fire. I have to go now, but I hope tomorrow we can look for another location together again."
Dumbfounded, John quickly told Denis he'd look again the following day. If he'd been able to pay his share of the store's price, he'd have lost everything he invested!
John had very little time to think. Everything was spinning, for not only had he just discovered he'd barely escaped death, but now also financial ruin. All the answers he had demanded were sinking into place more rapidly than he had ever dreamed possible. Now all his demands for answers seemed like mere childish complaints from a four year old demanding to know his destination.
A minute later, the phone rang again, and after a moment, Mary ran into the room and flung her arms around John. Trembling, she lifted her eyes to his.
"The doctors called. They were running tests on Victoria and found she has cancer. They say they've caught it so early she's going to be fine. Do you hear that, John? If she weren't in the hospital, they wouldn't have discovered it in time! She's going to live now."
Without a word, John sank into his chair. Through his hazy vision, he spotted his mother's locket lying on the table in front of him, the very same locket he had thrown into the water, now somehow in one piece. There it was, smiling at him to reassure him everything was all right, this same thing that he had flung away and not allowed to bring him comfort.
John rested his head on the table and buried it under his arms. Mary heard his gentle sobbing, and placed her hands on his shaking shoulders: "John, what is it dear?"
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